<p>GPA and having bragging rights of being the top 10% of your class is a major component of the college admission process. The Juniors are jostling for position on the college track. When the top 10% of the class is determined, does it include those students who did not take the tougher courses? So when one student gets a B+ in AP Physics and another gets an A in Physics, does the A always win?</p>
<p>I would guess this is the reason that some BS do not “rank” their students. (My knowledge is fairly limited, but I believe that Deerfield does not rank. I don’t think Thacher ranks, either, but that may have more to do with it’s relatively small size - 250 students.)</p>
<p>In many public high schools, they provide both a “weighted” and “unweighted” GPA. AP classes are assigned more “weight” to reflect their added rigor, and are worth 5.0 versus 4.0 (i.e. an A in an AP class would be 5.0, a B 4.0, etc.).</p>
<p>Ok, thanks appreciate the refresher.</p>
<p>While boarding schools don’t rank, Exeter (and I suspect others) does note the top 5, 10, 20 percent to determine cum laude, early cum laude, etc. And accelerated classes don’t “weigh” more than others.</p>
<p>A note on rankings: although many schools say that they don’t rank (and this is beginning to be a trend in competitive public schools as well as private), internally they may keep a ranking. This applies to GPA as well. The transcript may not have a calculated GPA because the school does not give it out, but internally they have it. This will have an impact depending on the school. It may be used to award honors and awards. It may be used in recommendations for competitive summer programs or scholarships. It won’t be on the transcript sent to colleges if they say they don’t rank or calculate GPA, in my experience. You probably won’t know what they do internally unless you ask. Some of these things become obvious, and you may hear from your kids something like X got an award for junior year first in the class (But …I thought they don’t rank). YMMV</p>
<p>HOWEVER, as a parent who has (thankfully) finished the college search and selection process, I would offer some very general observations on the GPA/rank question. As a family we visited many many colleges, studied common data sets, and asked many many questions. We visited LACs and universities. I think top grades from a school with good name recognition is very well respected. By top I mean 3.7-4.0 range without weighting. I think these students with testing scores commensurate with the GPA (to me this means 95% plus) will be happy with their admissions results, overall. However, if HYP only is your goal, this probably will not be true. I still think there is a randomness to those schools from the outsider perspective. I think students with good scores and 3.3 to 3.5 get into many really great colleges that would not be the case from a public school that is relatively unknown to college admissions. In fact even the 4.0 student from the “unknown” school might not fare as well. It is here (3.3-3.5) that I think the schools with a reputation valued by admissions committees really get more “mileage”. </p>
<p>As to the age old question, rigor versus grade, universally all admissions will answer better to get the A in the rigorous course. My own take on this is that it is a personal choice. Suffering through for argument AP or honors science when you are NOT a science kid is not worth it. Take the regular track and do well in that. However, do well at what you profess to be good at, and challenge yourself in that area. The colleges do look at the courses on the transcript and will try to evaluate the student. That does not mean one has to take every available AP. However, if you are going for the tippy top colleges, top grades, scores, rigor and extra curricular activities are necessary unless you have other special talent (olympian, inventor, music prodigy, what have you.)</p>
<p>This is just my opinion based on the facts that I have come across. You may find it not true depending on specific facts.</p>
<p>Thanks anothermom–great post!</p>